Faculty Handbook

II. I. RECONSIDERATION

(Source: Minutes of the Faculty, April 11, 2005; amended by the faculty on October 23, 2015)

A faculty member may ask the Committee on Advancement and Tenure to reconsider any decision affecting his or her employment status, pursuant to Article VII, Section 5 of the Faculty Constitution. Seeking a reconsideration is a two-step process. First, the faculty member must submit a request for reconsideration, in writing, within thirty days of the notification of the decision. Second, the faculty member must provide the Committee with a written statement indicating why he or she believes the original decision to have been in error. In preparing his or her statement the faculty member shall have the right to a copy of the file upon which the decision was based, along with a copy of the report to the President required by Article VII, Section 2 of the Faculty Constitution, with the following exceptions: letters in the file from faculty members and from external evaluators as well as qualitative (open-ended) course evaluation sheets and letters from both current and former students will be edited to remove identifying information (including name, title, institutional affiliation, and relationship to the candidate) contained either at the top of the evaluation form or letter or within and below the signature block of the evaluation form or letter. If the faculty member chooses to look at the file, all faculty members, external evaluators, and students who have contributed letters or open-ended course evaluation sheets to the file will be notified of this fact to the extent possible. The faculty member's written statement should be submitted either within thirty days after he or she has requested reconsideration or, in cases where the faculty member has also asked to have a copy of the file upon which the decision was made, within thirty days after having received that copy, whichever comes later. The statement may include requests for CAT to seek additional information, including new letters of evaluation from Reed faculty who may not have written letters for the original file or clarifying letters from Reed faculty who did write letters for the original file. The statement may also direct CAT's attention to, but should not include or be accompanied by, documents or other additional material not already contained in the original file.

On the basis of the faculty member's written statement, the Committee will decide whether it will reconsider the case. Reconsideration will occur only when there is, in CAT's view, a reason to believe that the original decision was significantly based on misconstrued, incomplete or faulty evidence. If the Committee chooses not to reconsider, it will indicate as much to the faculty member in writing. If it chooses to reconsider, it will describe in writing to the faculty member the form that the reconsideration will take.

Reconsideration shall involve a review of the original file, and may also involve requests by CAT for additional information from the faculty member and for amplifying letters of evaluation from faculty who already have letters in the file. Further, reconsideration may include, in the rare case, requests by CAT for letters of evaluation from faculty who did not write letters for the original file or a solicitation by CAT of letters of evaluation from all faculty members. However, no unsolicited materials will be accepted, and no new student letters or quantitative evaluations will be solicited or accepted. Once the reconsideration has been completed, the Committee will make a recommendation to the President. In all cases, the Committee will make every effort to ensure that the faculty member is informed of its decisions in a timely manner. Normally, a decision will be reached within 30 days after CAT has received all newly solicited material.

At any time during the process, the faculty member may initiate an appeal to the Appeals and Review Committee by written statement of intent. An appeal must be presented to the Appeals and Review Committee within 180 calendar days from the notification of the original decision. In the event of an appeal, the Committee on Advancement and Tenure shall submit a written statement on the case to the Appeals and Review Committee. The Appeals and Review Committee will decide if the procedures followed in the case by the Committee on Advancement and Tenure were fair and adequate and if the decision is supported by substantial evidence. The Appeals and Review Committee will complete its review as expeditiously as possible but no later than two weeks following the first regularly scheduled Trustee meeting of the following semester. If an appeal is filed with the Appeals and Review Committee after commencement, the next semester shall be construed as the spring semester of the following year.